


Nameless You Above Me

by SirAranIsWriting



Category: Fire Emblem: Soen no Kiseki/Akatsuki no Megami | Fire Emblem Path of Radiance/Radiant Dawn
Genre: Devotion, Gen, Worship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-11
Updated: 2016-09-11
Packaged: 2018-08-14 08:54:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8006593
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SirAranIsWriting/pseuds/SirAranIsWriting
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Some devotions go beyond loyalty, or even love. Some combine those feelings into something even greater."</p><p>(Written for a friend as part of Nagamas Summer 2014. The prompt was "Micaiah/+Volug. Songprompt: Love Dog by TV on the Radio. One-sided Volug->Micaiah preferred; other stuff is good too. Rating limit PG-13")</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nameless You Above Me

Pelleas adjusted his tunic, and brushed smooth the shoulders of his robes. Royalty though he might have once been, he was still about to address the Queen and King of Daein; he needed a few minutes to compose himself. Clearing his throat, and going over the reports from Talrega, Pelleas was finally ready, as he stepped into the grand hall.  
  
At the end of a long, velvet carpet were two thrones, side by side; the one most centre was the royal throne he once sat in when he was king, while the other was recently fashioned for the new queen’s husband. Speaking of, sitting in those thrones, dressed in rather modest finery, were the royal couple themselves.  
  
“Presenting, in the throne room of Queen Micaiah and King Sothe, Duke Pelleas!” cried the royal herald.  
  
Pelleas looked towards his old friends with a warm smile, which they returned, but then his eyes fell on the third figure sitting by the thrones: curled up at the queen’s feet was a large, brown wolf, massive as far as hounds would go.  
  
He chuckled nervously; he always felt a little bad he was never acknowledged, but then, why would they call out His Royal Hound, Volug?  
  
***  
  
Several years ago, at the end of the Silent World incident, when the goddesses Yune and Ashera returned to sleep, the Wolf Queen of Hatari, and her faithful subordinate Volug, had made a stop in Daein Keep, before they were to continue their return to Hatari.  
  
“It was a bit of a treacherous journey across the desert coming to Daein,” Nailah mused, a cup of tea close to her lips. “Still, if there’s one good thing about Rafiel deciding not to come back with us, the trip back to Hatari will go much faster with the two of us going full stride.” She chuckled, as she took her sip.  
  
Volug, ever taciturn, just stared out the window, towards the full moon. He was out of his wolf form, his legs curled on the window sill he sat upon, his arm draped across his knee, as his eyes were fixed on the moon, lost in thought.  
  
Nailah chuckled, and smirked up towards Volug. “Don’t tell me you didn’t appreciate that little tease. I can’t direct all my barbs at you, you know.”  
  
Volug continued staring out the window in silence, before he finally broke it. “ _(It’s been a long time since we left Hatari, hasn’t it?)_ ” he asked in the Ancient Language.  
  
The wolf queen’s lips flattened into a neutral expression of reminiscence. “A year, almost two, there about,” she agreed. “And to think, we’d be saying goodbye to it forever a few more years down the road once we begin the migration.”  
  
“ _(I think I’ve already said all my goodbyes.)_ ”  
  
Nailah smirked up at Volug, finishing the last of her cup. “Oh, do you intend to leave me to travel back to Hatari on my own?” she teased.  
  
Volug tilted his head down, looking a touch guilty.  
  
Nailah’s expression once again faded, replaced by a look of concern. “You don’t mean to stay here, do you?”  
  
“ _(With your permission.)_ ”  
  
“Stupid mutt. If you stay here, you’ll have to stay in your beast form forever!”  
  
“ _(Then it’s a good thing I can maintain it like you and the other kings.)_ ”  
  
Nailah frowned. “Things may have changed a little, but the people of Daein aren’t going to be thrilled about a Laguz living full time in their castle. Even if you were certain you were all alone, you could never reveal yourself as anything more than an abnormally large dog for fear of causing a commotion!”  
  
“ _(I’d gotten really used to that during my time here, previously.)_ ”  
  
There was a silence in the room, broken when the queen let out a rather long sigh. “I’m just trying to look out for you. You know that.”  
  
“ _(Of course.)_ ”  
  
“…She couldn’t love you. Not the way you love her,” Nailah warned, sounded upset and concerned.  
  
“ _(That’s not the point.)_ ”  
  
Nailah slammed her cup into the table, shattering it as the handle cracked under her tense grip. “Then what _is_ the point!? Why do you insist on staying, when you have no promise of fulfilment!?”  
  
“… _(Her people love her, as an excellent leader and as a symbol of what their country can be. That man, Sothe, he loves her, as someone as close to her as family. Those friends of her’s, the Dawn Brigade, they love her, too…but it’s not the love she deserves. No, not even love; reverence.)_ ”  
  
“Reverence?” Nailah repeated with a confused cock of her eyebrow.  
  
“ _(She was the vessel of Yune, the Goddess of Chaos and Freedom. Her entire life, she was the disciple, and later the avatar, of a part of the Goddess the created us all. More than the Apostle today, she is the closest thing to a connection to the creator we have. She was practically a Goddess herself back at the tower! What she does is a miracle, and someone has to acknowledge it!)_ ”  
  
The two wolves stared at each other for a while. Nailah finally relented, sighing as she closed her eye, before opening it again with a smile. “There really is no convincing you, is there?”  
  
Volug smiled back. “ _(Guess not. Besides, that Beorc, Ike…we still owe each other some language lessons.)_ ”  
  
***  
  
On the balcony of Daein Keep, on a cool summer’s eve, Micaiah stepped out, shedding her cloak to let the breeze play on her back. She sighed, content, and took in the night air.  
  
A soft whine caught her ears, and she turned to the entrance with a smile. “Good evening, Volug.”  
  
Her wolf companion looked to Micaiah, idly wagging his tail, before he got up off his haunches, and approached her, head tilted curiously.  
  
“If you’re wondering, Sothe’s out in the streets of Nevassa, leading some philanthropic project. I’ll be alone, tonight.” There was a beat, before she giggled. “No, I guess I will have you with me. Thank you.”  
  
Volug nodded, and looked out over the city.  
  
“It must be awkward, for you, not being able to change,” Micaiah mused. “It would be so much easier for you were I not queen.”  
  
The wolf shook his head. It wouldn’t change a thing.  
  
Curious, Micaiah turned to Volug, and crouched down to look him in the eyes. “So, why do you stay?” Volug didn’t answer, instead he nudged Micaiah’s hand. The silver haired maiden understood. While she no longer had the connection to Yune to allow her visions of the future, she still bore her brand on her hand. Lehran’s brand. The brand of the Herons, allowing her their power to see into the hearts of others.  
  
Micaiah touched her hand, and looked back over the city, as Volug did the same. Glancing to her wolf companion awkwardly a few times, Micaiah finally began to focus.  
  
What she saw in Volug’s heart was…powerful, and warm, but vastly different from any sort of warmth she found in the hearts of those like Sothe or Naesala. It made her uncomfortable, to an extent, as though being placed upon the highest pedestal one could find. And yet, there was an innocence and purity to that warmth, one even she wasn’t aware the wolf was capable of.  
  
The silver haired maiden closed her eyes and put on a small, content smile. “Volug…I am not a goddess. I merely played a vessel to one a few years ago,” she said, almost teasingly.  
  
“ _(Your connection to the divine is real enough)_ ,” Volug said in his heart.  
  
“If anything, I am merely a cult of personality.”  
  
“ _(Perhaps. But even a cult of personality doesn’t have the effect you do: when the world turned to stone, when Ashera was to punish all life for their misdeeds, we champions of Yune launched a three pronged march on the Tower of the Goddess. I travelled with my queen, and I could tell, from many faces there, there was a great deal of concern over the challenge that lay ahead, to take down a god. But I knew better. I knew there was a goddess on our side as well. And, more than that, I knew there was you. I had faith in you. And through that faith, I found comfort)_.”  
  
There was silence between the two of them, before Micaiah let out an amused sigh. “I’d like to hope my subjects have that level of faith in me as I take on my duties as queen, as you did back then. Your ideal of faith is remarkable.”  
  
“ _(I am just a loyal, nameless man)._ ”  
  
“And I am just a woman.”  
  
The two looked out in silence again.  
  
“The moon is lovely tonight.”  
  
“ _(Yes…bella luna)._ ”  
  
***  
  
Nailah looked out over her kingdom, hands draped on the barrier of her balcony. “I wonder, Goddess, why I stopped praying,” she said. “It was easy enough to leave it all to Rafiel…”  
  
She thought of her faithful subordinate. Her look turned to the moon.  
  
“So, I guess it was because…I’d never heard anything back.”  
  
***  
  
Micaiah and Volug continued to sit on the balcony of Daein Keep. The wolf turned his eyes to bella luna, and howled.  
  
Howled hallelujah.

**Author's Note:**

> Nagamas is a Fire Emblem fandom gift exchange done through Tumblr; every Christmas since its start in 2013 (and once for the summer of 2014), fans submit prompts, likes, and dislikes to the main Nagamas blog, which you can find, here: nagamas.tumblr.com


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